The last several decades have seen increasing concern about the effects of internal combustion engines on the environment. Such engines are, of course, the overwhelming choice for the power plant of vehicles of all sizes and shapes. Some of the concerns are related to energy conservation while others relate to emissions.
A number of the problems to be solved, and the approaches to their solution, are interactive. For example, improved efficiency of power consuming systems on a vehicle reduces fuel consumption which serves both energy conservation concerns and concerns about emissions.
In U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,408,843 and 5,520,015, both to Lukas et al, and issued respectively on Apr. 25, 1995 and May 28, 1996, there is disclosed a vehicular cooling system that addresses the foregoing concerns. Both the patents are owned by the assignee of the instant application and their entire disclosures are herein incorporated by reference.
In the system disclosed in the aforementioned patents, a liquid cooled condenser is employed in the vehicular air conditioning system. The condenser condenses refrigerant from the vapor phase to the liquid phase to recycle it to an evaporator where it is evaporated to provide cooling for some part of the vehicle. As disclosed in the Lukas patents, the evaporator is air cooled but in some instances, particularly where it is desirable to have refrigerant lines of minimal lengths so as to reduce refrigerant charge volume and where the location to be cooled is somewhat remote from the air conditioning system, it may be desirable to provide a cooled liquid to the point whereat cooling is required, which liquid is cooled by an evaporator located close to the other components of the air conditioning system.
The present invention is directed to providing a new and improved liquid cooled, two phase heat exchanger for use in systems such as those disclosed in the Lukas patents or anywhere else where heat exchange between a liquid and a fluid changing from the liquid phase to the vapor phase or vice versa is desirable.